


Delicate

by lacemonster



Category: DCU, Flashpoint (Comics)
Genre: Age Difference, Angst, Blood Kink, Canonical Character Death, Dark, M/M, Masochism, Medical Kink, Mildly Dubious Consent, Painful Sex, Painplay, Rough Sex, Sadism, Surgical Kink, Tragedy, Unhappy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-11
Updated: 2018-01-11
Packaged: 2019-03-03 14:31:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13343220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lacemonster/pseuds/lacemonster
Summary: Set during Flashpoint.In order to prevent his mother's death, Barry has traveled to the past, thus altering the timeline.After meeting Barry, Thomas Wayne finds his purpose. Having the opportunity to restore the timeline to one in which his son lives, Thomas works to help Barry preserve his fading memories. But as the Atlantean-Amazon War wages on, and Barry begins to struggle between the conflicting timelines, he begins to question what will happen to the world he'll leave behind--and what will happen to Thomas, once he's gone.





	Delicate

**Author's Note:**

> This fic started out with me wanting to write weird medkink/surgical-kink by abusing Barry's healing powers. But then as I went back into the story to try to flesh out Barry and Thomas' relationship, it started to grow a little out of control.
> 
> Thomas/Barry is a pairing that I've always been intrigued by and I'm sad to see that the pairing tag didn't pop up for me? Maybe I'm mistaken but I think I'm creating the tag for this pairing, which is sort of a sad thought. Hopefully this pleases some people that were also looking for Thomas/Barry written content, and maybe encourage others to write more?
> 
> That being said, this story is... not a happy read.
> 
> This story takes place during Flashpoint. The story is meant to be a little confusing as Barry is sort of meant to be an unreliable narrator. But that being said, the general premise should make sense so long as you've read Flashpoint (comics) or seen the animated adaptation/film. I've never seen the live action show so I can't tell you if the show will help you understand this story--I based this off of the comics/film.
> 
> I have changed a few things--for one, I slow down the amount of time that Barry is in this timeline. In the comics, the story happens really fast. I expanded it to a timeframe of a few weeks. Also, the storyline with Thomas, Martha, and Dent's twins takes place at the same time of this fic. Additionally, instead of having Barry realize why/when he changed the timeline in his fight with Thawne, I moved it to a little bit before the battle. You will see when you read it.
> 
> The sections in italics are flashbacks/scenes from the past.

The window in the parlor was broken.

Barry slowly approached it, glass crunching under his boots. From the direction of where the glass had landed, something had broken in instead of out. He cocked his head to the side, his brow furrowing. The moonlight poured in through the cracks, the black shadows of leaves flickering in the air.

An inkling of something— _something_ —nagged in Barry’s mind. Something important.

Barry squeezed his eyes shut. He tried to grab onto the memory.

Tried to hold on.

It was him. And one other. They stood in this exact same parlor. The orange glow of a setting sun had struck the walls. The paintings were not turned or torn. Instead, they hung up in memoriam, looking down from every corner. The room was clean. Immaculately clean. No broken glass, no dust, no leaves, no dirt.

The window had almost been the same. That same sunrise design at the top of the arch in dark wood remained familiar. But the one in Barry’s mind—it was cleaner, prettier, newer.

And there was something else. Someone's voice.

He couldn’t remember _why_ —but the voice was important.

If Barry concentrated, he could _feel_ it, but he couldn't quite grasp it.

“Allen,” said a different voice from behind him. Barry pushed it away, trying to focus on the memory.

They had stood in the parlor, Barry looking out the window. The sun was low in the sky, its rays so bright that it almost hurt to look. And then the other person—the other _spoke_ to him.

And—and it was important, those words. Barry remembered it being important, because he had never expected to learn the story. Never expected to be given the answer to the question he always had from the first moment they met.

Never expected that they'd _open up_.

“Barry.” The voice was closer.

“‘I shall become a bat’.”

Barry opened his eyes. The moonlight so soft that it did not harm his sight at all.

So overwhelmingly dark, that it was difficult to see. Difficult to focus.

“That's what he said,” Barry said, remembering. He looked over his shoulder. A pair of familiar, but different, blue eyes looked at him with quiet questioning. Barry nodded a little to himself, as if confirming to himself that the memory was real. “‘Yes, father. I shall become a bat.’”

 

Everything was either too slow or too fast.

Barry could feel it. The pulse of his heart. Fastfastfast.

His eyes rapidly moved around the room, everything blurring together. Images overlapping each other. Sounds mixing together.

The sound. Not sped up. Slowed down.

“What's happening to him?”

The words—they echoed. But they were slow. Like—like how he'd always imagine hearing underwater would sound like if he could just grasp the words.

Barry’s eyes. They moved, taking in everything. He could see it, every single crack in the ceiling. By God—he could _see_ the light. A ceiling light slowly swung like a pendulum and he could watch shadows flickering around the room, the rays travelling through the open space—

His eyes moved left. A man. A machine. One brown eye, the other glowing red. The images, they blurred. He saw a kid. No, a teenager. But then he saw all machine. Cold steel. Blue turning to green.

“The mnemonic changes,” another voice said.

 _Mnemonic changes_. Right. He had experienced this before. He was Flash. He was living between two timelines. And everything—it was all mixing together.

Barry’s eyes travelled right. He could feel his eyes moving in his head. He could feel everything.

“It’s happened before. Hold him still. I'm going to administer the phenytoin sodium.”

Barry stared into two red eyes that peered out from long black shadows. The eyes flickered from red to white to blue. Barry caught a glimpse of the instrument that was cradled in black gloved hands. Watched it in motion, liquid in the barrel.

“Br…” Barry tried, in the midst of his shaking. His lips fumbled around the sound. A breath of air trapped in his throat.

Red to white to blue.

They were too slow in loading it. The plunger sunk like it was dipping into molasses. It was too late by the time the syringe loomed toward him—Barry could feel it. He could feel everything. He could feel the energy wearing down on his body. The corners of his vision growing fuzzy and dark. His body heat rising and rising like fire underneath his skin.

He stared up at the face that loomed over his.

To blue.

“Br—Bruce…”

He blacked out before he even felt the prick of the needle.

 

_They were sitting in the parlor. The sun was setting. Barry didn't sip from the teacup in his hand. The warmth had long faded from the porcelain—but the fragrance, albeit subtle, still lingered in the air._

_“I know how it seems,” Barry said quietly._

_He couldn't bring himself to look up from the cup, even though he wouldn't drink it. He looked away mostly in shame. But his eyes fixated on the details of the cup—the grooved edges and delicate handle and gold rim._

_He couldn't forget being a kid._

_Mom loved teacups. She drank earl grey in the afternoons. And the cups, they always had little designs in the interior. Right at the bottom. It was always a word or a playful cat or a flower coming into bloom. But sometimes the tea was so dark, Barry couldn't see the bottom of it._

_But that was the magic of it. To keep going. To get to the bottom and see what waited there at the end._

_“It’s stupid—that’s what everyone tells me. I know. I've worked a million cases like this. They all end the same. It's easy to think that maybe—maybe I'm in denial.”_

_Barry stopped, feeling suddenly frustrated with himself. All he could think about was every night he spent cramming for a final. All the promises he spoke into a telephone with a piece of glass in front of him. How he had tricked himself into believing that once he was working in forensics—_ for real _—then that'd be it. The pieces of the puzzle would fall together. Dad wouldn't have to wait anymore, he could just come home._

_“When I think about the man who killed my parents, I don’t think I could ever find it in myself to forgive him.”_

_Barry froze at the words. He finally dared to look up at Bruce, who stopped to drink his tea. Past him, a painting hung over a fireplace. A man and a woman stared back, a sense of quiet importance in their demeanor. Barry’s gaze focused on the man for a moment, his dark hair, his near-frown, his blue eyes. Then his gaze fell back to Bruce in the chair._

_Barry didn't wait for him to finish his sip. He rambled on._

_“I know. I know that it could be… might be… a disgrace to my mom’s memory. Maybe_ believing _in my dad is_ actually _what makes me a bad son. But I don't believe he did it. I just—I can't.”_

_Bruce’s cup was set back on the saucer. Soundless. Bruce’s eyes seemed faded, looking at nothing in particular._

_“I couldn't forgive my parents’ murderer.” His brow furrowed ever so slightly. “But if I had any chance of bringing my father back—”_

_He suddenly cut himself short. The words hung in the air for a moment. Barry let them._

_“I'll take a look at what you have,” Bruce said suddenly._

_Barry sat straight up. There was a moment of disbelief—until he saw the calm look in Bruce’s eyes._

_“You're serious.”_

_“I can't promise to find anything. And I can't promise that what find is what you want to see.”_

_“I just want the truth,” Barry said, speaking before he could think._

_Bruce leaned back in his chair, head turned in the direction of the window. Barry followed his gaze and found himself setting his tea on the table._

_Barry moved toward the window, staring at the sun hanging over the bay._

_“With a view like this, I'd watch every sunset,” Barry said. He then paused, eyes drifting to the window itself. He looked at its polished frame. “This window is different from the others.”_

_“We had to replace it,” Bruce said. “A couple years ago, a bat broke through it.”_

_“Wait,” Barry said, looking over his shoulder. His eyebrows were raised. “Is that why…”_

_“Sit. I’ll tell you the story.”_

_Later, when the story had ended, Barry finally made it to the bottom of his teacup—and he found himself smiling at the surprise waiting there._

_A single poppy, resting on a thin stem._

_Another one of Mom’s favorites._

 

Barry woke up in the cave. It was difficult to call it the batcave, even though it resembled an _actual_ batcave far more than what he was used to.

Tinkered objects and broken boxes scattered the rocky floor. There was a loud hum of a generator, designated near a living area—if it could be called that. Thomas’ rickety corner was nothing more than a few floor mats, a cot, a few shelving and storage units, and the bare minimum amenities. It was a far cry from the polished floors and glass displays and dinosaur-sized trophies that was Bruce’s safehouse.

For once, Barry didn't wake up in a surgical chair. He supposed he should have been grateful for that. He sat up, the cot groaning underneath his movements. In the distance, under the glaring light of an otherwise pitch black cave, he could see Thomas at his work bench.

Barry had passed out in the Flash uniform. He moved to sit at the edge of the bed.

He stopped and looked at the Flash ring on his hand for a moment. A sudden thought occurred to him, as if recalling a forgotten memory.

 _Iris_.

He paused for a moment, frozen. In awe of what had just happened inside his head. Then his gaze lowered, his heart sinking.

Did he almost forget?

He pressed on the ring, switching outfits. He got up, moving toward Thomas.

“You should be laying on your side,” Thomas said, not looking away from the red batarangs—would they be called batarangs, in this timeline?—in front of him.

“It wasn't a seizure,” Barry said.

“Even so. It's late.”

“Why aren't you sleeping, then?”

“I don't sleep,” Thomas said simply. Barry knew it to be true. The man’s eyes were always red and the dark circles spoke of more than just age.

Barry didn’t follow Thomas’ orders. He found a nearby chair and pulled it up, taking a seat next to Thomas. He watched Thomas for a moment as he worked, quietly admiring the complexity of the object he tinkered with. Despite himself, Barry chuckled a little.

“Man, you two… are really similar.”

Thomas’ hands paused, only for a moment. Then continued. Barry took his silence as permission to keep talking.

“Bruce… he had help over the years, of course. But in the beginning, at least, he designed all of his own equipment. Some of the things he invents, for himself and for the League… I don’t know how to put it. It’s all just so creative. So intuitive. He has this way of just figuring out how everything ticks. He can fix anything.”

When Thomas didn’t say anything, Barry felt suddenly embarrassed. He just wanted to share Bruce with Thomas. He didn't want to _gush_. But he couldn’t help it—he never quite appreciated Bruce’s contributions to the team until he took the time to reflect on it. It took seeing Thomas’ cave for Barry to realize the magnitude of the empire that Bruce had created from the ground up.

Barry rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly.

“I guess he got it from you,” he said.

“No,” Thomas said. Barry watched him carefully. “He got it from her. I had the knowledge and the skills, sure, but she— _she_ was the creative one. If something was broken, I replaced it or stepped away from it. But she never gave up on anything. There was nothing she wouldn’t try to fix. In the manor, in the city, in the world. Nothing.”

Barry went quiet, knowing exactly who Thomas was speaking of. He knew it wasn’t his place, but he found himself asking without thinking, “Did you ever try to help…”

Barry trailed off, the words stopping on their own.

There was no need to elaborate. Without looking up, Thomas responded, “There’s nothing to fix there. She was broken even before Bruce died—Bruce, he was just… the final push, is all. There’s nothing more I can do, she’s already been replaced.”

“You know, Bruce, he—”

“You should really get some rest,” Thomas said, and that seemed to be the end of that.

Barry was conflicted. He wondered if there was anything more that he could do. Anything more that he _should_ do. When he looked at Thomas’ face, he saw the image of a man who had given up. Barry patted the table and got up.

“Night, Doctor.”

 

_Barry was left waiting in the parlor, staring at the grandfather clock. He knew the clock led to the cave, but he hadn't the faintest idea of the passcode. Instead he watched the pendulum swing left and right._

_Barry hadn't noticed the footsteps entering through the doorway. He didn’t even see the moving shadows until Bruce was already in the center of the room. Barry moved to stand up—but Bruce’s pace was brisk, and he managed to throw down a case folder on the coffee table before Barry could get to his feet._

_Barry looked at it and sunk back down in the chair. He picked up the case folder, brows furrowing slightly at his dad’s name printed on the top, and he looked back up at Bruce questioningly._

_Part of him still hung onto the hope that maybe Bruce really had solved it in that short amount of time. But Barry was also wise enough to remember that Bruce had never_ promised _to find his mom’s killer._

_“There's nothing more to find,” Bruce said simply._

_“I don't understand,” Barry said, frowning. “You're a detective. You solve everything.” Barry shook his head to himself, his hands tightening around the folder. “You're telling me you can't solve it?”_

_“You were right—there was a lot of missing evidence. But there also wasn't anything to prove that he_ didn't _do it.”_

_Bruce turned his back on Barry, moving back toward the other room. Barry’s blood boiled. He sped up, getting behind Bruce and forcefully turning him by the shoulder, forcing the man’s eye contact. Bruce looked back at him, eyes filled with a quiet surprise that suddenly went cold._

_“Innocent until proven guilty! That's the law!” Barry tried to protest._

_“They wanted to give your mom justice.”_

_“Framing my dad isn't_ justice.”

_“I have other cases that need attention.”_

_“I built my_ whole life _around this case.”_

 _“You don't think I know that?” Bruce said, the edge of his voice a growl. At that, Barry had to stop. “You asked me to look over the evidence and I did. I_ told _you that I might not find anything. I_ told _you that your father could still be guilty. If all the evidence is true, then the possibility of another killer doesn't add up.”_

 _“You looked at it for a_ day. _”_

_“I offered to help and I did. You're taking your frustrations out on me, like some entitled child.”_

_“My mom was killed and my dad is rotting in jail—”_

_“People like us don't_ get _closure, Barry,” Bruce said, cutting him off sharply. “That's what you're not getting. It doesn't matter how many cases you solve, or how many nights you break your back, there is_ nothing _in this world that is ever going to bring your mother back.”_

_Barry’s hands dropped to his sides, clenching into fists. He wasn’t usually one to rush into anger—and admittedly, a small voice of reason was still trying to rein in his emotions. He knew what he was signing up for by asking Bruce to work with him. He knew the man’s reputation—that he could be cold, stoic. Even harsh. Barry also knew that his request could even be an inconvenience, especially given Bruce’s busy lifestyle._

_Even so, Barry found himself unforgiving._

_“If you didn't want to help me, you should have just said so.”_

_“You're wasting my time.”_

_“God, everyone was right. You are a real fucking asshole.”_

_There was no reaction in Bruce’s face. He suddenly turned on his heel, heading back toward the archway._

_“I'm sure you can walk yourself out,” he said, not looking back._

 

There was nothing more disturbing to Barry than seeing Batman clean a gun. The disassembled rifle was seemingly strewn across the table—until Barry noticed that certain pieces seemed to have formed their own little rows. He watched Thomas’ hands, efficient and precise, clean the barrel of the cradled weapon with the utmost care.

Barry finally picked his head up from the table, chin resting on his propped up hand.

“How can you save people using those things?” he said, unable to restrain his accusatory tone.

“Not all of us are willing to get struck by lightning,” Thomas said. His tone wasn’t any peachier.

“Bruce refuses to use guns because of what happened to you and Martha.”

“And I use guns because of what happened to my son.” There was a cold chill to his tone. “If you want to try using my dead son against me, you’ll have to come up with a different argument.”

At that, Barry shrunk back a little.

“Hey, sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.”

Thomas didn’t say anything more. Barry watched his face. The man’s eyes were still pink—Barry supposed neither of them had been sleeping much these past few days. With the growing occurrence of the mnemonic changes, they had been rushing to find a solution to fix the timeline out of fear that Barry might forget about Bruce and the others before the task was completed.

Barry knew that returning to his timeline might not fix the one he was in. It could erase Thomas’ timeline entirely. Possibly worse, this timeline could continue on as if nothing had happened, existing in its own pocket of reality.

There had been this lingering question standing between Barry and Thomas since the beginning. Barry knew that Thomas had wondered it too—the man was too intelligent, too _Batman_ , to not consider the darkest possibilities. What was going to happen to Thomas when Barry returned things to the way it should be? Perhaps Thomas could rest easy knowing that Bruce, in some reality, had survived. But when Barry looked at the man and saw the weariness in his face—all those lines and scars, that dark gray hair, the unkempt appearance—he feared something much worse. He feared that Thomas might not ever move on.

“Have you thought about Cyborg and the others?” Barry asked, shifting in his chair. “They still want you to join their side.”

“I already know the ending to the Atlantean-Amazon war. It all ends in flames,” Thomas said. His voice lowered by a touch. “Only one thing matters right now.”

A sudden, loud beeping interrupted their conversation. Barry lifted his chin, spotting the frantically-blinking red light on Thomas’ control panel.

“What is that?”

Thomas didn't explain. He got up from his table and stalked over to the computer, pulling up video feeds. Barry ran up to join him, staring at the displays. All the different angles of the Wayne estates were shown before them. At his speed, Barry was able to spot it before Thomas did.

“Oh God,” he said, fingertips tracing over the screen. A shadowed figure had broken into the manor. The person was sitting on the steps of the grand staircase, the front door swung open. Their head was hung low but Barry, in the faint grainy footage, could catch the hint of their hair color in the natural light coming from the doorway. “Isn’t that—”

“ _Mmr_. Stay here,” Thomas grumbled, forcefully pushing Barry into the computer chair.

“I thought you said she was dangerous,” Barry said, spinning the chair in his direction.

“Only when she smiles,” Thomas said, glancing back. Barry noticed his cowl was still hanging around his shoulders. “She’s different when she cries.”

Barry shifted in place uncomfortably, wanting to argue that it looked like Martha was smiling to him. That Martha could _only_ smile, after what she had done to her face. Thomas didn't talk about his wife much—but the few comments he made was enough to make Barry uneasy. Barry could still pull a few horrific memories of the Joker from his timeline.

“I don't think this is a good idea, Doctor,” Barry called after him.

“Didn't ask for a second opinion.”

“So what should I do?”

“You're not doing anything. You're staying in that chair,” Thomas said, voice firm, and he headed toward the stairway.

Barry tried to calculate the amount of seconds it would take for him to speed from the cave to the manor’s foyer. Could he beat the speed of a bullet? Barry turned back toward the direction of the monitors, where he could see Thomas entering the parlor. Barry watched as Thomas’ form crossed from one monitor to the next.

Martha didn’t move from her seat, even when Thomas took the spot on the staircase next to her.

Barry watched for a moment longer, waiting for an indication that it was time for him to go in and save Thomas. But then a feeling slowly fell over him, like he was in the process of intruding on something private. Until he finally turned away from the monitor.

 

“There is no fixing her. I tried.”

“Then why did you talk to her? Why not take her to Arkham?”

Something that Barry had learned about Thomas: he always argued first, and when the fight was gone, he would fall back into silence. Barry sighed when Thomas stopped speaking. Barry went on ahead, nearing the edge of the rooftop. He stood over Gotham City. It had always been a dreary place—but Bruce’s Gotham, Barry now realized, had this homey quality to it. Stone buildings lined the streets. Gargoyles watched from up above. Grand bridges named after the original founders. It was a place that honored its history, and there was comfort in the familiarity of the old architecture.

An ugly casino took up the center of Thomas’ Gotham. Half-constructed buildings and steel beams cut across every corner. Light-up signs flickered offers of greedy indulgences. This Gotham had masked all of its old buildings in neon.

“Do you have a wife?” Thomas’ voice was not so distant.

“Yes,” Barry said. He was certain of it.

“Do you have any kids?”

“No,” Barry said. Then he hesitated. Something nagged at him.

“What?” Thomas said, noticing his serious expression. Barry shook his head, trying to think. But whatever idea or memory was there, it slipped like sand through his fingers.

“There was—there was this kid. I think he was really special to me.”

The words were strangely difficult to speak. It filled him almost with this sense of guilt. He hadn't felt guilt when he almost forgot Iris. Fear, yes, but _this_ —Barry felt almost like… like he had done something wrong. Like he had broken a promise or let someone down.

“A brother?” Thomas said, clearly grasping at ideas rather than facts. His quiet way of encouraging Barry to think. To remember. To not forget.

“No,” Barry said. Quietly now. “Never had siblings. I've always been alone.”

Always alone. He was just a simple, quiet Midwestern kid who lived with his mom and dad. Didn't have a lot of friends. Studied a lot, worked in a lab, kept to himself. Was too afraid to approach women.

 _No, wait_. _No_. Not Mom and Dad. Mom was dead. Dad was in jail.

Didn't have time for friends. Always worked. Couldn't hold down a girlfriend. Always had his head in the clouds. Was always focused on Dad’s case or Flash stuff.

Always alone.

 _No_ …

Not always.

“I lost it,” Barry finally confessed.

“It’ll come back,” Thomas said, resolute.

Tires squealed in the distance. Thomas turned his head, like an animal sensing a noise in the brush. But he didn’t immediately dart towards it—he watched, waiting for the ensuing sirens, and when they came, he relaxed his shoulders.

“I’m afraid of what you’ll do once I’m gone,” Barry said, not quite through with confessions. Thomas didn’t look back. The wind came through, picking up his cape and enveloping his form. To Barry, there was something even more distancing at that moment, and he found himself vaguely thinking of Bruce again. Wondering how many nights there were when it was just him and the cape on his shoulders.

But… Bruce hadn't been alone either. Not always.

Right?

Everything was blurring together.

“I’ve known for a long time that I should have been the one to die in that alley.”

“Gotham still needs you. This whole world needs you.”

“I know that too. I tell myself that, every night. That I still have a use, a purpose. That this city needs to be healed by me. But it doesn’t matter. You being here, telling me that I can fix the worst mistake I ever made, has given me more purpose than I’ve felt in my entire time as Batman.”

“I don’t know what’s going to happen to my mom when I leave,” Barry said, unsure of what else to say. “In my timeline, she’s dead, and I’m not sure if I can take her with me.”

“I’m sorry,” Thomas said, turning around to face him. Barry felt Thomas’ words and knew that he meant it. Could see it in his faint expression beneath the cowl.

They stood a moment longer on the rooftop. Barry found himself thinking of Victor and Emily and the others. He almost wanted to beg Thomas to join their side—because he knew that once he left this timeline behind, he wasn't just going to be leaving his mother behind. He was going to leave _all_ of them.

“I wish I had been kinder,” Thomas suddenly said.

Barry stayed quiet. Thomas’ brow slowly furrowed, his frown deepening. Barry could feel his stomach twist with dread, unused to the unusual display of weakness in Thomas’ demeanor.

“He was shy. Kind—but too sensitive. I saw the parts of myself that I hated inside of him. I wanted to change him, so that he wouldn’t repeat my mistakes. So that he’d be stronger. I was too hard on him—”

“Thomas,” Barry said, grabbing his arm. Thomas didn’t shrug him off. “Bruce… he forgave all of that. God, he and I weren't exactly the best of friends, but it was so clear how much you and Martha meant to him.”

A distant crash. They both looked. Barry sensed some movement in the alley.

Thomas didn’t let this one go. He grappled onto the opposite rooftop, swinging off and heading toward danger. Barry didn’t let him go alone. He raced for the alleyway.

 

_Just like it had been that day, all those years ago, the temperature was neither too warm nor too cold, and the clouds were swollen and dark with rain. Barry had borrowed Iris’ car and nearly crashed the damn thing merging onto the highway—lack of practice had made him rusty—all for the sake of preserving the bouquet of flowers in his hand. Mom liked red, so the arrangement had roses and poppies and berries with hints of green and white. Despite the color of his costume, Barry actually preferred blues and greens in his wardrobe, and so he had to settle for an old red shirt that had a loose thread on the sleeve._

_Nora’s grave sat between her mother’s and a stranger’s. Henry was buried in a different cemetery altogether. Thinking him guilty, the rest of the family never reserved the spot next to Nora._

_When Barry approached the grave, he was surprised to see a small white wreath sitting there. He almost thought a cemetery caretaker was responsible but then he looked up, spotting a figure around the corner of a grieving angel. Barry took a step forward—then remembered to lay down the red bouquet._

_Barry went to catch up with the departing figure. The person did not speed up his steps, whether because he already knew running away would be pointless or because he was ready to talk, Barry was not sure._

_“What are you doing here?” Barry asked. Bruce’s eyes flickered in his direction once before gazing forward. His footsteps slowed to a stop._

_“I figured I’d visit.”_

_“You didn’t have to do that.”_

_“Was I intruding?”_

_“No,” Barry said at once. Nora’s death had never been a secret, especially not to Bruce, who Barry had tried to ask for help in regards to her case. “I’m just surprised, is all. I didn’t think you—”_

_Barry stopped himself. He couldn’t stop the thought, no, but it’d be cruel to say._

_“You didn’t think I cared,” Bruce said for him in no particular tone. Barry’s face burned in embarrassment._

_“I didn’t mean it like that. Sorry. I spoke too soon. It means a lot to me, that you visited. But how did you—”_

_“When I worked on the case, I made note of the date your mother died. Today, when you said you weren't attending the Justice League meeting, I figured you'd be here. I thought I’d leave something on the grave.”_

_“For her or for me?” Barry asked. At that, Bruce hesitated._

_“My timing was off. I thought I’d be here before you. I didn’t mean to interrupt your time with her.”_

_Seeing Bruce’s discomfort, Barry felt like he had to save him. Barry rubbed the back of his neck, trying to think of what to say to ease the tension in the air._

_“You don’t have to leave yet. I don’t know if the dead actually hear our prayers but… you can say a few words, if you want.”_

_To Barry’s surprise, Bruce followed._

_“I come out here every year,” Barry said, as they stood before Nora’s grave. He wasn’t sure how to fill the uncomfortable silence so he kept talking. He glanced over nervously at Bruce, just once, wondering if Bruce felt just as awkward. Instead, Bruce was focused on the grave, his expression being one of quiet contemplation. Barry, still uneased, kept talking, the words tumbling out of him. “I've run out of new things to tell her since I joined the force. Before, I'd make promises. Tell her about school, college. Now I just…” Barry’s gaze fell back on the grave. He could feel his face falling. “God, I don't even know what to say anymore. It's like I've been running in circles ever since. Every year is just another promise.”_

_Bruce was silent. Listening. Barry sighed softly._

_He took in the details of the intertwined flowers of the wreath. He wondered, briefly, what Thomas and Martha’s favorite colors were._

_“What if all this—this stress and pain, what if it's all for nothing? That's what I keep asking myself. What if I wasted years of my life trying to mend something that can’t be mended? All because of some stupid promise I made when I was too young to know better?”_

_“Barry,” Bruce said suddenly. Barry looked at him. Bruce’s face was stoic, blue eyes still fixated on the grave. But something in his eyes shifted. Mellowed. “I'm sorry about the case. I was honest when I said that I couldn't find anything more. But I should have handled it better.”_

_A cold wind passed by. The red bouquet turned uneasily. The wreath remained steadfast._

_“It's alright,” Barry said, and he meant it, even if his heart was heavy._

_“It's set to the time of my parents’ deaths.”_

_Barry looked at Bruce questioningly._

_“The clock. In the parlor. The exact hour and minute.” The access to the cave. Barry found himself humbled to learn this secret. Bruce suddenly turned toward him, their eyes locking. His voice firm, Bruce said, “You're not running in circles. That promise you made—it’s what drives you forward. It's the thing you hold onto in order to keep going. You need it.”_

_Neither of them said anything more. Barry spoke his final words to his mother in private thought. When the rains finally rolled in, starting as a few drops and easing into a light downpour, they started to make their way back to the cemetery gates._

 

“What happened?” Barry asked.

Over Thomas’ head, Barry could see the caution tape crossed over the iron gates. Blinking red and blue lights cast colors on the name _Wayne_ carved into the stone post. When Thomas did not answer, Barry did not feel frustrated like he usually did. He knelt into the dirt, facing Thomas head on. The man’s head was leaned against the tree trunk behind him, blood decorating his cowl and the corners of his lips.

“Did you talk to your mother?” Thomas said, diverting the subject. Barry closed his eyes.

“No,” he said. “I couldn’t even knock on her door. I wasted an hour just staring at the porch.”

“I told her.”

“Martha?”

“About Bruce. About what we were doing.”

“She didn’t take it well.” It wasn't really a guess.

“She was happy.”

“So what went wrong?”

“I told her the rest. I told her what he became without us. And she fell.”

“She fell?”

“She jumped,” Thomas said.

His head fell forward and he rubbed his face in his hand. The blood smeared onto his chin.

 

“I've been thinking—you said in the timeline you were from, some things were the same and some things were different. You recognized me. So does that mean, in the other timeline… the accident…”

Barry wondered if there would be less harm in lying. It wasn't as if Victor ever had to know that he was part machine in both realities. Barry could have made up a story—maybe weave a tale about how Victor had gone to college on a football scholarship, became a scientist like his dad, that they had met through S.T.A.R. Labs—but Barry had never been much of a liar.

“Yeah. The accident still happened. You're still Cyborg,” Barry said.

Victor didn't say anything. Together, they watched Thomas. Thomas was in the process of analyzing some Atlantean tech that Victor had salvaged from one of the battles. Barry was certain that Victor could have done it on his own—but it seemed that Victor hadn't given up on pestering the man to join his team.

Thomas must have suspected the same. Barry could only think that Thomas was humoring Victor.

“You look a lot different than the Victor Stone in my timeline though,” Barry said. “You're a lot more…”

Barry trailed off, realizing his mistake. Victor simply rose his brow.

“Machine?” he said. He made a small noise, neither irritated nor happy. “I wasn't always this way. Got some upgrades after the war started—but it took a toll on my body. My heart was starting to give out. Had a choice between dying as I was—or taking out my heart completely.”

There was a softness to those final words. Victor’s brow was deeply furrowed, as if he was still living with the difficulty of that decision. Barry let the weight of Victor’s words sink in.

“If you decided to take out your heart, then you'd have to rewire everything,” Barry said in quiet understanding, a heavy feeling washing over him. He always knew how much Victor cared about his human half. He never wanted to be Cyborg. “But if you didn't do it, then you'd die, and then what would happen to Earth?”

Victor nodded once.

“That was the game-changing question. Was it better to live the rest of my life, dying with what kept me human?” Victor began, a thoughtful look on his face—as if he was still asking himself that question. “Or was giving in to the machine, giving up my heart to save people's lives, actually the most _humane_ thing I could do?”

Sensing Victor’s unease, Barry spoke up.

“You sacrificed more than any teenaged boy would have, and you took control of the cyborg part of you as a way to _help_ people. There wouldn’t have been anything selfish about choosing your mortality, Vic,” Barry said.

Victor shrugged a little. “Tell that to the human half of my brain.”

In the distance, Thomas set down the weapon long enough to take notes.

“I’m surprised he agreed to help you. I’m not sure of his intentions but maybe there's hope for change—you two have been on the same side lately,” Barry said.

“Yeah… I’m hoping the same. I can't fight this war alone. But I’m not kidding myself—I already know there's only one person he _truly_ wants to help,” Victor said. He snorted a little, glancing down at his metal hands. “The things fathers do for their sons.”

 

Thomas’ head fell forward, his shoulders sagging. Then he jerked up, his movements so sudden that it caught Barry’s attention.

Barry turned away from Vic—who was the one driving the vehicle—long enough to glance over at Thomas. He stared into the red lenses of the cowl, unable to catch Thomas’ eyes. Still, it didn’t take a lot of detective work to realize that Thomas was nodding off.

“You should catch some sleep, Doctor.”

“Stop calling me that,” he grumbled, his voice thick. He lifted his head and straightened his back. Barry wasn’t fooled by the display of strength. He found himself narrowing his eyes, his chest swelling with anger. “I’m not a doctor anymore.”

“It’ll be a few hours before we pull into New Metropolis anyways.” Eyes flickering back at Vic, who was fixated on the road but could very well be listening, Barry chose to lower his voice to a harsh whisper. “You haven’t slept in days. I know you haven’t.”

“You don’t know anything,” Thomas said, the corner of his mouth lifting up into a sneer.

“I know that you haven’t been yourself. You’re Gotham’s protector—but lately, you just don’t seem to care about anything. If you don’t take the effort to at least look after yourself, you’re going to end up seriously hurt.”

“This isn’t about saving me. Remember?”

“So who is it about then?” Barry said, frustration rising. He could see Thomas’ scowl deepening, ready to argue, but Barry wasn’t going to relent. Not this time. “Is this about saving Bruce? The timeline? Being Batman is about being a hero. There are people depending on you. You can't just give up.”

“Don't talk to me about ‘giving up’,” Thomas said, pushing back. “I've been living in this hell for two decades now. You've been here for maybe a few _weeks_. I only have one mission and it has nothing to do with this war. There's nothing left for me here—”

“Bruce was never so selfish. Bruce was a hero—”

“Bruce _is_ ,” Thomas corrected, cutting in sharply. He gritted his teeth. “Bruce _is_.”

“Are you two saying something back there?” Victor said, speaking up. His tone was almost cross.

Barry and Thomas both glanced at Victor. Barry, almost very suddenly, was reminded of their company. He crossed his arms and leaned back into his seat, nearly resentful enough to never speak to Thomas. Thomas, seeming to have the same sentiment, stared straight ahead and reverted into silence.

The tunnels that Victor took toward New Metropolis were dark and seemingly endless. Barry watched through the windshield, nearly hypnotized by the endless loop of concrete walls. His brooding anger, still lingering inside of his chest, was the only thing that prevented him from falling into a daze.

“Why is it so important to you?” Thomas said, his voice nearly a whisper.

Barry was taken aback, almost wondering if he imagined that Thomas was the one to break the silence. This was a first.

Almost forgetting his anger, Barry said, “You're going to have to take care of my mom when I'm gone. Victor and Emily too. All of them.”

Eyelids lowering, the other part of the truth dawned on Barry.

“And you, too. You have to take care of you.”

“I'll be dead once you leave. It won't matter.”

Barry was sick of this conversation.

“So what are your favorite colors?”

“What?”

“For your funeral,” Barry said, his words almost forceful. “What should I leave on your grave?”

“Black, gray and red.”

The colors of the batsuit. He was being sarcastic.

Barry supposed he had it coming.

“Fine,” Barry said, voice begrudging. And a front. He shrugged his shoulders up a little higher, his arms wrapping around himself tighter. “I'll take that with me when I go.”

 

Barry stumbled. He held out his arm, trying to catch the nearest surface, and he managed to touch a brick wall.

Everything was spinning. He stared at the ground, the image moving back and forth. Between daytime and nighttime. Between this Gotham and _his_ Gotham.

Barry felt acid rising up through his throat. He concentrated, trying to focus himself.

“Allen.”

Barry took a step forward. Then another. Then he collapsed to his knees, hitting the hard cement. He barely felt the pain, too focused on the dizzy spinning in his head. The different visions that passed before his eyes.

A hand touched his shoulder. Barry glanced over, finding Batman kneeling next to him.

Barry felt a name sitting on the tip of his tongue. But the one that left his lips was, “Thomas.”

Thomas said nothing, though something in his expression shifted. The hand on Barry’s shoulder ran down his arm, the touch almost relaxing. Barry’s vision wouldn't stop spinning but he could feel his heartbeat begin to even out. He leaned into the brick wall.

“Don't forget his name, Barry,” Thomas said, voice almost soft. “Don't forget Bruce.”

Barry looked at Thomas’ floating appearance. The red lenses of the mask beginning to take the shape of something else.

Of all things, Barry’s memory pulled the glare of a red streetlight.

Barry tried to remember the significance of that image. But just as fast, the memory was gone. Barry closed his eyes, trying to slow everything down. Trying to stay grounded.

“Barry,” Thomas said. Trying again. “Don't forget.”

Barry reopened his eyes. Everything started to come into focus. Thomas was reaching for his belt, likely trying to find his syringe, but Barry grabbed his wrist and stopped him.

Barry didn't realize his hands had been shaking until that moment. Thomas joined Barry in staring down the hand on his wrist.

“You seem fine for now—but the frequency of these mnemonic changes are increasing. If we don't figure out the problem, you'll forget Bruce.”

“What about you?” Barry murmured.

“I'll be fine. We just need to focus on finding Thawne for now.”

Barry shook his head, the back of his crown rolling across the brick wall. Thomas didn't understand what Barry was asking him—and Barry wasn't sure if he could explain.

 _Am I going to remember you_?

 

There was a bullet trapped inside Barry’s shoulder.

Barry’s hair was damp with sweat. It had been awhile since he last felt… exhausted. But he had been running for a long time, trying to save humans from the crossfire of an Atlantean-Amazon battle, and it was an even longer run to get back to Gotham.

“You have to take it out,” Barry said, groaning. His gloves were abandoned, suit pushed down to his waist, and his hand was clasped tight over the bleeding mark, blood seeping between his fingers. “I don’t know what it’s doing—but it’s not healing right. It keeps closing and reopening.”

“We’ll get it out,” Barry caught Thomas saying. The man was on the other side of the cave, taking his time in gathering his equipment. He finally rolled over a steel table with all his things, the table rattling as it moved across the bumpy ground. Barry wasn’t a doctor, no, but he couldn’t help but wonder if the environment was suitable for a surgery. It was a far cry from the clean hospital rooms he had seen in the past.

There was a wheeled stool next to the surgical chair that Barry was confined to. The old, fraying chair creaked as Thomas took a seat. Finally coming into the light, Barry got a look at Thomas’ face. His cape and cowl were set aside and his face had transformed into something completely new. Something that was neither Batman nor the weary man that Barry had become used to seeing. He had a calm demeanor—a stark contrast to Barry, who hadn’t needed to see a doctor in years due to his accelerated healing factor and preferred it that way.

Barry felt a sting in his shoulder, a fresh surge of blood spilling from the wound. He groaned deeply and Thomas looked up at him, his eyes sharply alert.

“I thought your powers took care of all wounds.”

“Doesn’t stop pain,” Barry said between gritted teeth.

“I can still put you under.”

“I’ll be fine. Just do it.”

“This is going to hurt,” Thomas said, yanking Barry’s hand out of the way.

Barry took each arm of the surgical chair, gripping it tightly, trying to keep his hands out of Thomas’ way. He tried to take even breaths, tried to calm his racing heartbeat, as Thomas reached for his instruments, silver gleaming in the air. Barry stared straight up at the burning fluorescent above him, trying to ignore the twist in his stomach as he imagined what was about to come.

Thomas’ hands were remarkably feather-light as they rested on each side of the wound. Barry winced as a sharp point pressed against the tender flesh.

“Your skin is partly closed over the bullet. It doesn’t look good but it seems stable. If I take it out, however, you’ll bleed more.”

Thomas’ words seemed like a final warning, as if to say _it’s not too late to stop this_.

“The wound isn’t able to close itself up,” Barry said, adamant. “I can feel it working around the bullet. The bullet is just stunting and irritating the healing process.”

As if that was all the permission Thomas needed, the hot scalpel pushed into Barry’s skin, splitting the surface open. Barry felt this spark of annoyance, irritated that he wasn’t warned, but he didn’t dare to voice his complaints and risk an argument. His jaw clenched and his hands wrapped around the edges of the armchair as the cut was reopened.

“Can’t remember the last time I had a patient,” Thomas said, in a way that it seemed he was musing to himself.

Barry finally glanced over. Upon seeing the gush of dark red dripping down his arm, he instantly regretted it. He was a forensic scientist—he spent most of his days in a lab with his nose in old blood, guts, and other bits of unfavorable evidence. As a vigilante, he had stained his hands in blood. By no means did he have a weak stomach.

But from time to time, things involving hospitals and surgical procedures would freak him out. He grimaced deeply, moaning behind closed lips, feeling his stomach churn.

The seconds ticked by. He listened to the light clinking of metals.

“How am I doing, Doc?” he asked, hoping the joke would take his mind off the warmth that travelled down his skin.

“I’ve had worse whiners,” Thomas said. His almost light tone—as unexpected and strange as it was—took some of Barry’s edge off.

Barry could feel something blunt touching the inside of the raw wound, the hot sting of the cut forcefully widening. Despite his shaky nerves, Barry managed to maintain his calm, almost as if his fears just needed time to ease, like a nervous flyer after takeoff.

Beyond the bright fluorescent, Barry could see the rocky ceilings of the cave. He watched bats as they crisscrossed the walls. When Barry had first met Thomas, it was in this cave. Barry saw him as Bruce. Thomas saw him as a stranger. Then Thomas attacked him—severely. Barry could still recall those bruising blows.

Gaining some of his courage back, Barry dared to look at Thomas. The man’s hands were delicately precise. His hardened face was intense and focused—and yet strangely relaxed. Like this was all second nature to him. And Barry relaxed too, knowing he could put his trust in this person.

“Do you miss it?”

“You shouldn’t be talking,” Thomas said, and Barry’s eyes rolled up when a pair of scissors and tweezers appeared in Thomas’ hands.

“I understand the vigilante part—but I don’t understand how a surgeon finds himself pointing guns at people.”

“At criminals.” Barry squeezed his eyes shut when he heard a sickening squish. The bullet started to move inside the wound. Thomas made a small sound, almost a huff. “I keep cutting and your skin keeps trying to reclose itself…”

“You really don’t need to tell me that,” Barry said, stomach twisting.

“The first patient I had was a criminal,” Thomas said. Barry tried to focus on Thomas’ voice, hoping his story could take him away from that chair. However disgusting the story could have been, Barry would rather hear it than listen to his own body reopen over and over again.

Barry released the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding.

“Why’d you become a doctor anyways?” he managed to choke out.

“Well, I told myself I didn’t do it for the money. I was sitting on an inheritance and I didn’t _need_ money. I thought I wanted to learn—and I suppose that was true. Really, I probably did it for any reason a young man wants to step outside of his legacy: to piss off his parents. My parents wanted me to focus on the family business and we argued back and forth about it for years. They didn’t get the final say when they passed away.”

“Then what?”

“I had a position at an emergency trauma center in the Narrows. They brought in this kid—fifteen years old—who had suffered from a gunshot wound near his spine. The Narrows is a rough area. There are a lot of kids from broken families. They get wrapped up in gangs and crime. This kid had a mother who loved him deeply—but for whatever reason, he wouldn't stay at home and he wound up somewhere he wasn't supposed to. Never learned the whole story. Anyways, by the time he was on the table, he had lost two pints of blood.”

Barry could feel it—the bullet wriggling underneath his skin. Pushing through blood and tissue, closer to the surface now. Barry listened to the soft scrape of the tweezers against the hard material.

“Normally, you don’t remove bullets. But his was a special case. The slug was close to his spine—I figured it’d be safer to remove it than leave it in there. But he had lost so much blood that any removal would be risky.”

The bullet was pulled from Barry’s body. The strange sensation felt almost relieving, like cracking a knuckle. Thomas dropped the bullet on the tray with a _plink_ , then started to wipe away at the spilled blood. Barry could feel the speedforce already working to stitch his body back together.

“After all the things I’ve seen and done, helping that boy was easy in comparison. But his mother—she called me a miracle worker. She said I had God’s hands. And I was young and I believed her. I was so proud of myself that day. Made me fall in love with the field.”

Barry watched Thomas carefully. The man’s eyes were faded, lost deep in thought, as if he were transported somewhere else. Somewhere beyond this cave. The gauze was pressed to Barry’s wound. Thomas didn’t even seem to realize that it had stopped bleeding.

Thomas’ face slowly fell, the wrinkles around his eyes seeming more pronounced, his frown deepening.

“Sometimes I think about all the time I spent learning and training and preparing—and how little it all meant in the end.”

“Thomas,” Barry said, removing the hand from his arm. “You can stop now.”

Barry’s eyes followed Thomas’, down to where there should have been a bullethole or scar. Instead there was no mark, nothing to prove that anything had happened. As if it had never happened.

“Do your powers heal everything?”

“Not everything.”

“You never asked me how Bruce died.”

“He was shot in Crime Alley. Then the guy who shot him—Martha, she…”

“That was the cause, yes. But you never asked _how_ he died. Is it because you figured you knew the story or because you didn’t want to know?”

“I consider Bruce a friend. So yes, part of me doesn’t want to know. But mostly, I think I just don't want to make you tell me.”

“Even if it was my fault.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Barry said without pause.

“You don’t know that.” Thomas’ dark brows came to a furrow, shadows casting over pale blue eyes. “He pointed the gun and I could have let him take the shot. I went after him instead. In the process, I moved his arm. Then the gun went off.”

“It was a mistake. People make mistakes, Thomas. Just like how that kid on the table made a mistake.”

“If I hadn’t done anything. If I had just moved the gun a little further. A little less. The bullet would have missed Bruce. Instead, the bullet hit an artery and he bled fast and—and if it had just struck anywhere else, I might have been able to help him. I might have been able to save him. By the time Martha came back with help, he was already gone. He didn't even stand a chance. The things I'd give, if he only had a chance—”

“You’re more innocent than you realize.”

“Of course you’d say that. You like to believe people are innocent.” His words were accusatory but his tone was soft. Barry’s gaze lowered. He stared at Thomas’ blood-stained gloves. “Don’t you understand what I’m saying? I moved the gun. My son was shot because of me. He kept telling me he felt cold—‘ _I’m cold_ ’—and I… I only let him bleed.”

“You were just trying to do what you thought was right. That's all we ever try to do. But sometimes—sometimes we don’t get chances to make things right. Sometimes you can't fix what's broken,” Barry said. He could feel something twist inside his chest. That familiar feeling of guilt. Barry found himself wanting to take Thomas’ hand. Wanted something real to hold onto. But he didn't. “Sometimes… sometimes you even try to fix things and they just—they get _worse_.”

Thomas. He always argued. Until he couldn’t.

Barry waited for the moment. Waited for the moment, the story, that would make Thomas open up to him. But Thomas wasn’t Bruce. Bruce was dead. Bruce was somewhere else. And Barry—his mother was alive, his father was innocent, and he couldn’t remember the people he was supposed to grieve. There was no parlor to sit in, no tea to drink, no story to tell.

Even so, Barry could feel Thomas’ pain. Could feel it as if it was something tangible. And even if he couldn’t remember the cause, Barry could feel that same hurt inside of him. In a way, the pain was the one thing that tied them together.

“How long does it take for a cut to heal?” Thomas said.

His fingertips touched where the mark had been, as if waiting for it to reappear, and Barry fixated on the touch. His heartrate picked up but he was not afraid.

With the slightest hesitance, his words particularly careful, Barry said:

“You can see for yourself. If you want.”

Thomas looked him in the eye, and Barry found himself wanting to look away but unable. Thomas’ expression, ever serious, seemed thoughtful for a moment. He turned his head back toward the stainless steel table and reached for the scalpel. Barry’s stomach tightened but he remained still.

Thomas’s hand returned to Barry’s shoulder. Feather-light.

The scalpel pushed into Barry’s skin, fresh blood streaming along the edges of the steel. Barry winced. The blade dragged down and Barry’s jaw clenched, holding back his voice. The stinging pain wrapped around the curve of his shoulder to his arm.

Thomas pulled away, as if to observe his work. They both watched as the cut faded in color. Shrinking in size. Until it was gone.

“How long was that?” Barry asked, expecting Thomas to be the one keeping count of the seconds.

Thomas didn't respond. His gaze lingered on the spot of the invisible scar. Barry stayed silent, his heart beginning to pound when he saw the scalpel still resting in Thomas’ hand.

“Thomas.”

Barry started to move toward him. Thomas, with just a gentle hand on Barry’s chest, pushed him back into the chair. Barry sat there, back flush with the plastic cushions.

Barry’s gaze followed the sharp blade as it moved closer to him. Thomas’ stool creaked as he leaned over, his shadow crossing over the armrest onto Barry’s form, eclipsing the hot lights. He was so close that Barry couldn't see over his head as he began to cut across his stomach.

Barry felt like the air was pulled out of his lungs. Barry’s head fell back on the chair, his eyes squeezing shut in pain, as the scalpel slowly inched up the center of his torso, stopping at his sternum.

Barry could feel hot blood prickling up to the surface in beads. His skin itched as it healed itself back together. Through half-lidded eyes, Barry looked at Thomas again. When the cut was finally healed, Thomas’ hand moved again.

This time, Barry did not pull back his gasp. The sound cut through the otherwise stagnant air. The scalpel cut deep, crossing diagonally from below his chest to his hip. Drops of blood rolled down his side, leaving heat in its tracks.

Barry reached for Thomas’ shoulder, ready to push him away, but he stopped himself. His hand hanging in the air. Thomas didn't even see it. Barry placed the hand back on the rest.

Thomas continued this. Cut. Bleed. Heal. Cut. Bleed. Heal.

When Thomas sat straight up, Barry got a good look at his own body and felt almost sickened by the tracks of red across his skin. But there were no scars. Thomas reached for the table, pulling a cloth. The cloth was slowly unfolded. Each side of the blade was wiped clean. Barry tensed as the cloth was applied to his skin, most of the tracks wiped away, other areas stained pink. The soft material felt gentle. Almost relaxing.

The cloth was set back down, the blade was not.

Barry’s breath quickened, chest rising up and down, his head falling back onto the chair.

“Thomas, Thomas please—”his voice was nearly breathless.

The hot scalpel dragged between Barry’s pecs, down the line of his torso. Barry’s hands tightened around the armrests, teeth bearing down, the tendons in his neck straining as he resisted the urge to move hastily away. Unable to resist the sharp, drawn-out pain, he arched in the chair, his toes curling.

Thomas pulled away the scalpel. He leaned in, kissing and licking where he had cut, his lips and tongue oddly soothing. It felt so nice, so comforting, that Barry nearly forgot the pain.

Barry’s skin was on fire, his skin steadily healing itself back together. When it was done, Barry let out a heave of breath, eyes closing.

Thomas’ mouth continued to travel, lips wrapping itself around Barry’s nipple. Barry squirmed in the chair, his whole body feeling sensitive. On edge. Each fragment of himself was anticipating any possibility of what Thomas had in store for him. The flat of Thomas’ tongue teased Barry’s body. Barry arched his chest off the chair, closer to Thomas’ mouth. Despite everything, Barry could feel himself growing erect.

A large hand reached between Barry’s legs, grabbing him. Barry gave a low groan, his face burning. He found himself rocking into Thomas’ hand, his cock quickly swelling. Quick and rough, Thomas snatched the folds of Barry’s clothing and yanked it past his hips, freeing his erection.

Barry shuddered at the cool air, the hairs on his arms rising. He watched as Thomas peeled off his darkened gloves, setting them aside on the table, the blue cloth on the tray spotted in drops of red that saturated the fibers and bled at the edges. Like flowers in bloom. Thomas cupped Barry’s erection, his hand rough and weathered, but so warm. Barry’s eyes travelled down, past his rising and falling abdomen to his groin.

Everything about Thomas was massive. Barry stared at the hand that enveloped his cock, taking in the size of his knuckles and veins. The sharp angles and blunt nails. But they worked studiously. Thomas massaged Barry’s cock in a way that was almost methodical. As if knowing exactly how Barry ticked.

Barry was already a mess. He couldn't stop shaking. His cock twitching in Thomas’ hand. His voice releasing in shuddering moans.

Barry saw the gleam of the scalpel in his peripherals. Lightning quick, he grabbed Thomas’ wrist.

“Thomas,” he said, voice nearly pleading. He wasn't sure if he could take anymore.

Thomas looked up at him, blue eyes subdued. Barry had questions. He also had nothing to say at all. At Barry’s silence, Thomas resumed.

His hand was stroking Barry’s entire length now. Hand twisting closer to the tip, closer to where it was most sensitive. Not fast. Barry could feel the heat pooling into his groin, his cock pulsing. Something sharp pricked near his clavicle, its movement uneven across his skin, and Barry hissed between his teeth. Thomas sucked at the cut, lips travelling further up, into the crook of Barry’s neck.

A thumb pressed against the head of Barry’s cock, smearing the precum there. Before moving back down, fingertips rubbing over the sack, then further down. Further.

Thomas’ hand disappeared between Barry’s legs. Barry tensed up as Thomas’ finger inserted inside of him, the sensation tense and strange. Barry was breathless, his lips parting as Thomas’ finger kept pushing. Pushing deep inside. Down to the knuckle.

Barry’s heartrate sped up. He felt like there was something inside of his chest trying to gnaw its way out. Thomas’ precise movements were making it hard to focus. Everything was hot. His head had gone hazy.

Thomas’ finger stroked him from the inside. Trying to find his prostate. Hard knuckles moved inside of Barry’s tight heat, the fingertip circling around. Barry felt like he had to squirm away—but he kept himself still on the chair, his legs spread.

Barry breathed out a curse when Thomas stroked something inside of him. A spark shot down Barry’s spine. Catching on fast, Thomas repeatedly rubbed the sensitive spot. Over and over. Barry sucked in a breath, struggling to hold himself still when every fiber of his being seemed to be falling apart at the seams.

“ _Ah_ —”

Every movement inside of Barry was intentional. The pace. The angle. Thomas’ thumb rubbed idly over Barry’s perineum as the finger thrusted inside of him, grazing repeatedly over his prostate. Thomas’ mouth, never ceasing, went back to Barry’s nipple.

There were so many sensations happening at once. Barry’s face was burning hot. He could feel his body clenching around Thomas’ finger. His dick was hard and aching, laying heavy and neglected against his stomach. The air of the cave was cool but Thomas was so, so warm.

Barry’s pleasure built up with every slide against his prostate. His breaths were heavy and needy, a steady chorus in his ears. Thomas was silent in comparison, save for the occasional sound of his wet lips on Barry’s chest, or a rare exhale.

Thomas’ movements were almost teasing. Thomas gave just enough to keep Barry panting, but never enough to make him scream. It felt so good that Barry could have begged— _harder, deeper, faster_. Just when Barry felt like he couldn't take it anymore, Thomas started to push in a second finger.

Barry finally reached for him, a hand grabbing onto Thomas’ bicep, gripping hard. Thomas ignored him, dark gaze fixated on Barry’s lower half, fingers pushing and pushing. Barry could feel the stretch of his body. The dry friction. It was uncomfortable. It almost hurt.

Thomas moved, the stool making a soft sound as it was relieved of Thomas’ weight. Barry watched him. Thomas loomed almost intimidatingly above him—then kneeled near the footrest.

Barry felt oddly exposed. Thomas was nearly at eye level to Barry’s waist, his observant hawk’s eyes staring as he worked his fingers inside of Barry. Barry felt a tinge of near-embarrassment, not used to this type of attention from Thomas, the lamps feeling almost like a spotlight. He could only imagine what the angle looked like from Thomas’ perspective. He had to push away the thought as Thomas’ thrusting began to pick up, his head turning away from Thomas’ direction.

Thomas’ fingers twisted inside of Barry and despite the pain, Barry could also feel this dull pleasure that was steadily building inside of him. He stared at Thomas’ face, so close to his cock, and was filled with the sudden and intense desire for Thomas to touch him.

A sharp sting, more intense than anything Barry had felt thus far, broke out against his skin. Barry let out a surprised sound and looked down at the source of his pain.

The blade had scraped unevenly along his inner thigh. Barry could feel his thighs quivering, his stomach fluttering. He lifted himself on the armrests but Thomas’ fingers chased after him, still pushing inside of him, deeper than they had ever gone before, and Barry nearly sobbed. His body folded in half, head hanging. Partly trying to see what Thomas was doing to him, but mostly too weak to sit up straight. His cock, hard and pointing, twitched between his legs. A drop of precum rolled down the length.

His sensitive skin prickled as it healed. Thomas leaned in, licking the drop of blood that trailed down his leg toward the seat. Barry watched as the older man’s lips pressed against his thigh, blood staining the corner of his mouth, and it was crude and disgusting but Barry had never felt so on-edge.

_Harder. Deeper. Faster._

“Oh my God,” he breathed.

The fingering sped up. Feet planted on the footrest, Barry’s hips lifted off the chair and pushed back against Thomas’ fingers. A string of desperate, needy moans strung together, spilling past his lips.

Both of Thomas’ hands withdrew. Thomas rose, his hand fumbling to reach for the steel table, abandoning the scalpel with a clatter. Through his pleasure and haze, Barry’s eyes followed Thomas as he pulled off his clothing. Barry felt something stir inside of him, his anticipation twisting inside of him as the uniform rolled off of Thomas’ body.

Inch by inch, his chest and stomach was revealed. Ugly scars and bulletmarks and dark hair. Massive, heavy arms. Faint lines of strong veins visible beneath the skin. He was erect—Barry hadn't even noticed he was erect—and Barry knew exactly where this was going.

Barry felt no impulse to stop it either. He felt empty inside and the healing factor felt like an itch he couldn't scratch. Both of these sensations felt more unbearable without Thomas there. He found himself yearning for it, for more. Even if it hurt. Especially if it hurt. He needed Thomas to take care of it. To take care of him. To ease his desires and give him what he needed.

Thomas’ demeanor seemed different. Yet, it was somehow familiar. He repositioned Barry on the chair, hands pushing with a sense of authority, and Barry complied. The chair snapped with loud sounds as the armrests were moved, readjusted. Barry faced the dark gray headrest, his breath tightening inside his chest. His attention fixed on the chair as it moved and groaned behind him.

Barry could feel Thomas, hot and heavy against his crease. The head of his cock pushed up against his rim. Barry stared straight ahead at the plastic of the chair, his nerves jumping as Thomas grabbed him by the hips and started to _push_.

The feeling of being breached was hot and blunt and it took more willpower than Barry had to keep himself relaxed. It was difficult, it hurt, and Thomas only pressed on. He was hot and thick and Barry could feel his body stretching to accommodate the head, struggling to accept, struggling to stay open. He groaned against the headrest, voice muffled, all while the hot friction increased— _God_ it hurt. He could feel sweat gathering near his hairline, his face so hot. His entire body tensing. His heart racing.

Barry thought, in a brief flicker of common sense, that maybe he should stop Thomas. That maybe the pain wouldn’t get better. That it’d be better to push him off, grab him, beg him to stop.

But he didn’t.

Because part of him wanted to see if they could do it.

Part of him wanted to see if, after all the pain and struggle, something good was going to come out of it in the end.

He didn’t want Thomas to turn away. Not now. Not after all this.

Thomas was deeper now. Barry could feel every inch of him, stretching him wide, wide enough to hurt. He was big. He was too big. Barry felt fire in his chest, in his face, in his ears, behind his eyes. His legs were spread and his knees felt weak and his thighs were trembling as tried to stay propped up. It took all his grit, maybe even his powers, to bear through the pain.

Thomas made a low sound, just above a heavy breath. His grip on Barry loosened, his hips stilling. Barry breathed and all at once, he _felt_ Thomas. Felt the entire length buried inside, hot and deep, balls pressed against his ass. Barry felt so—so _full_.

And it hurt. It hurt and it was uncomfortable. But he was also aching hard and maybe it was sick that the hurt didn’t drive him away. Maybe he was sick for feeling so excited, so aroused, his heart racing and blood burning like adrenaline. But Thomas felt like everything Barry had been craving and somehow Barry still felt like he needed more.

Thomas didn’t waste any time thrusting into him. Barry was breathless from the first movement, his eyes closing shut, a shiver running down his spine. He felt every inch that dragged out of him and drove back in, Thomas giving him the entire length of his cock. Thomas’ hands ran up and down Barry’s back, the touch almost whispering for Barry to relax. But while there was a carefulness to the hands that ran over Barry’s body, there was nothing loving. Each movement felt more calculated than passionate.

Every long thrust increased the heat in Barry’s body. He could feel his breath quickening. Could feel himself getting lost in the rhythm of their movements, his knees gently rocking against the cushioned plastic. This almost mesmerized feeling overtook him, letting himself get lost to the pleasure that Thomas was granting him. His vision dark, he listened closely to Thomas’ breathing, barely catching the hitch in his breath. Listened to the subtle creak of the chair underneath their weight. Every sound twisted inside of Barry, making him even more aroused.

He could feel himself pushing back, the roll of his hips almost hypnotic. His movements challenged Thomas to go deeper, go faster. In his daze, Barry noticed the heavy hands that roamed his back were starting to stutter. Starting to lose focus.

Each thrust made it easier to keep going and going. Barry could feel his cock aching, wanting more. Thomas pushed in particularly deep and their moans were simultaneous. Thomas grabbed onto Barry, callused hands gripping him hard, holding Barry in place there. Cock buried deep, grinding inside of him as if it still wanted more, as if it could get more.

Thomas pulled back. Thrusted in again. Their hips met with a sound. Barry could feel his legs easing apart. Another thrust and Barry was pushed up against the chair, face and chest flush against the plastic, knees digging into the seat, hips pulled up by Thomas’ grip.

Their movements were getting louder. Thomas’ speed was picking up. Barry could feel Thomas inside of him, grazing against his prostate, and the feeling was maddening.

Barry grasped for something. Anything. His hand grabbed the edge of the headrest, leather and cold steel pressed into his palm, grip tight enough to make his knuckles go white. Thomas’ large hand followed, nearly swallowing Barry’s, fingers slipping into his.

Barry looked straight ahead, eyes focused on their nearly intertwined hands.

Thomas’ hands, strong and yet capable of such delicate precision.

His fingernails and ring stained red.

Thomas’ hands. They could bruise. They could heal.

Thomas suddenly growled under his breath, the noise rumbling deep into Barry’s ear, his breath touching the shell of his ear and the back of his neck. His voice sounded deeper, more animalistic, and Barry shuddered in response. The pounding of Thomas’ thrusts followed suit—he was slamming into Barry hard now, their bodies meeting with a sound.

Barry was pushed into the chair each time, cheek pressed hard against the plastic. He could feel the ache inside of him, Thomas splitting him open. It hurt and burned but it felt so good that Barry didn’t even notice the hurt anymore.

Suddenly, Thomas’ teeth sunk into Barry’s shoulder. Barry gasped, his cock pulsing in response. The tension increased, pushing hard enough to draw blood. Barry’s skin was hot around the mark—he could feel the flat of Thomas’ tongue against his skin, heard the throaty moan rumble against his skin, and Barry’s eyes squeezed tight in response. A whine crawled up his throat, past his lips. The head of his cock was wet.

Thomas kept fucking him deep and wide, balls slapping against Barry’s ass. The sound was crude and perverse, it made Barry feel weak somehow. He kept his knees spread, Thomas’ weight bearing down on him, as this man pounded into him.  Thomas’ whole body moved on top of him, rocking him, the chair groaning underneath them.

Thomas was long and thick and hot inside him. Barry’s eyelids fluttered—he wanted more, this wasn't enough, he wanted more—

“Come on,” he whispered. Thomas’s lips dragged across his skin. Not kissing. Nipping. The sharp grazing of his teeth made Barry shudder and groan. His cock throbbed, heat pooling in his groin, and he wanted more, needed that friction. He breathed hot against the surface, his voice panting with desperation. “Come on, _fuck me_.”

He could barely lift himself up—but his hips pushed back to meet Thomas’. He could actually feel himself starting to sweat across his body—it was the heat. The heat of their bodies, the heat of the lights, the heat of their efforts. And he could feel it—the adrenaline racing up and down his body. Blood pulsing in his veins.

Wanted more. Needed to get fucked. Faster. Faster. Faster.

Barry’s vision blurred for a moment, everything going quiet. He watched, mesmerized, hypnotized, at Thomas’s reflection on the polished steel table not too far away. Watched as it slowly moved forward. Then grew fainter.

Barry realized it a moment too late. Everything slowed down, which meant Barry had sped everything up. Couldn't remember the last time he lost control like that. Couldn’t remember. He opened his eyes and the sound resumed all at once.

Thomas’ grip on Barry’s hand tightened. His hips stuttered.

“Don’t speed up like that,” Thomas said, and it seemed to Barry that Thomas meant to speak strictly, but his voice sounded strained instead.

“Can’t. Can’t help it,” Barry said, moaning as Thomas readjusted his position on the chair, his cock slipping in at a different angle. Barry’s eyes nearly rolled, a rush of heat pushing through his body as Thomas’ cock moved around inside of him.

The heels of Thomas’ hands pushed down on Barry’s hips, pinning him to the chair, bearing all of Thomas’ weight. Thomas gave Barry long strokes of his cock, plowing into him deep. The movements quickly become erratic. Thomas’ voice was growing increasingly vocal, grunts and groans escaping him, and Barry could tell that he was close. Maybe even closer than him. And Barry was surprised by how much he wanted it. Wanted it so bad that he could already feel it.

“Inside,” Barry gasped. He licked at his lips, just now realizing he had bit down on it at some point. He could feel the tender cut under his tongue. His back arched, ass pushed back on Thomas. “Please. Inside. Come inside me—”

Thomas drove his hips forward, as deep into Barry as he could. So deep Barry felt like he could split in half. Thomas’ cry was ragged as he finished. Barry stilled as felt the first wave of Thomas’ climax—hot, thick seed coating his walls. It felt intoxicating. Barry moaned for it. Begged for it. Thomas filled him up, hips lolling back and forth, as if wanting to get his seed in as deep as possible.

There was so much of it. Barry could feel some of it dripping around Thomas’ cock.

Thomas pulled out—and just as fast, his fingers plunged in. Somehow, heat still managed to rise in Barry’s face. He could hear it—God, he could hear it—as Thomas’s fingers thrusted inside of him. His fingers were thick but nothing like his cock, but they did work faster. The movements were looser, yet more purposeful. They swirled around him and curled up against his prostate. And God, that sound. That sound of Thomas’ ejaculate inside of Barry, all while he got fucked by Thomas’ fingers. It was so perverse that it turned Barry on. So much so that his cock began to tremble.

Barry reached for his cock, fingers vibrating against the flesh. Thomas plunging his fingers into his hole repeatedly. He could feel Thomas’ lips against the cheek, feels teeth against his skin, fingers filling him up and sloshing around and pounding his prostate and—

Oh God, it felt good. Barry’s hips were trembling and shaking. His face was so flushed and hot that his eyes burned and he felt like he could cry.

Barry felt his cock pulse—and then suddenly, it seemed like everything rushed through him at once. Heat dropped into his abdomen, through his groin. Barry’s hand on the chair, placed for balance, gripped tight—and he could have screamed. Instead, he gave an elongated moan, his cock shaking in his hand as his seed spattered the chair. Thomas fingerfucked him through it and Barry gave a choking gasp, his cock still shaking as he came.

His body sagged all at one, collapsing into the chair. Thomas backed off of him. As Barry worked to catch his breath, he could hear the subtle sounds of movement behind him. Thomas moving around, or cleaning himself up, or something. Barry paid no mind to it—he let his eyes fall shut, focused on the rhythm of his own deep breaths. Trying to let the waves of his pleasure settle down, his heartrate evening.

Finding himself increasingly uncomfortable, Barry turned in the seat, careful to avoid the mess. His eyes fell on the table first, the stained scalpel and bullet rolled off to the side of the tray. Barry’s eyes followed the edge of the table to the stool where Thomas was sitting, then travelled along the contours of the man’s back, taking in the long scars. His gaze inched up Thomas’ spine to the head of dark gray hair.

“You never did say goodbye, did you?” Thomas asked after a moment.

Barry wasn’t sure what he meant. He supposed there were a lot of people he had never said goodbye to. Victor. Iris. Bruce. Dad. Mom. And all the others he didn’t have names for.

Barry sat at the edge of the chair, slowly starting to put his uniform back on.

“You should say it while you still have a chance,” Thomas said. The words were stern—but almost a forced kind of stern. Barry didn’t say anything. He stared down at his body while he dressed, letting Thomas speak business. “I never got to say it to Bruce. Or Martha. When we fix the timeline, you’ll never come back, and your mother—”

“Goodbye, Thomas.”

Thomas stopped.

Moments later, breaking through the silence:

“Goodbye, Barry.”

 

Barry stood at the window in the parlor. The sky was beginning to lighten but it not quite dawn. He could hear heavy footsteps entering the room but he did not look back. Neither of them said anything, the hushed whispers of swaying branches filling the silence.

“I finally remembered,” Barry said after a moment.

The floorboard creaked lightly, followed by the soft groan of furniture. Barry finally turned his head, glancing at Thomas, who sat at the edge of the dusty couch. His elbows rested on his knees, his hands were folded, both body and head bowing forward. Barry took a seat in the chair across from him, silent for just a moment, then began his story.

“It was the first time we met,” he said. The memory, which he had forgotten for so long, was clear as day in his head. He remembered the busy streets of Central City. The sun was raised high in the air, reflecting off of the office buildings. Iris had been there too. Barry described it all as it replayed in his head. “I asked him about his trip. He said it went fine. I asked him if he knew what a ‘keystone’ was. He said no.”

Thomas said nothing, the shadows of the room extending to his face, obscuring his features. Barry went on anyways. And just as he had back then, he held up his thumb and index finger, as if some object was held between it.

“I told him that when the old architects started building across the bridge, back when it was all still called Central City, they kept making these archways. And the way they made the archways was by using these things called ‘keystones’. I told him that keystones are placed at the top of the arches and that the way it works, is that all of the weight from the neighboring stones—they all lean into each other. One after the other after the other. And the ‘keystone’ bears all of that weight, balancing out the archway. Making it stand.”

Remembering the next part, the corner of his mouth began to twitch.

“And I said—I said, ‘That’s why they call it Keystone City’. And he just looks at me—this ten-year-old kid, he looks at me—and he says, ‘You’re kind of a nerd, aren’t you?’”

Barry stopped himself, his face breaking into a grin. He tried to bite on his lip, tried to stop it, but the first chortle fell out of him, followed by the next, then the next. He leaned forward, resting his face in his hands, and kept laughing. His shoulders shaking.

He laughed until it hurt.

When the laughter had finally faded out of him, he stayed still for a moment, his face still buried in his hands. He closed his eyes for a moment, letting everything stay dark for a moment. He breathed, his heavy sigh shuddering past his lips.

“Christ, Barry,” he whispered into his hands. He rubbed his hands over his face, finally straightening his back. He stared at the old, unused coffee table that stood between him and Thomas. Its surface bare, save for the dust and dirt. Barry could feel something tighten in his chest—and though it hurt, he had to say it. He had to explain himself. “I had something good. I had something really good. I know that. A lot of people—they don’t get to experience that. They don’t get to move forward.”

The busy streets of Central City. The sun reflecting off of the buildings, into Iris’ hair. The brief glimpse of her smile looking back at him, over her shoulder, before she took off running. Wally racing ahead of her, trying to get to the other side of the street before the timer on the pedestrian cross could blink to zero. And Barry, perfectly capable of beating that busy red light, but far too content to follow behind. The blur of traffic speeding by him as Iris and Wally jeered at him from across the street, and the smile he didn’t try to fight back.

He could remember it all. But he wasn’t smiling now. He felt a deep shame in his chest. Guilt. Guilt for leaving them behind. He kept talking, kept trying to make excuses.

“People. They always tell you to move on. _Move on_. But how do you forget something horrible like that? How do you forget about someone—someone that you respected and admired and loved—and just _forget_? Just forget about them getting _killed_?”

“Tell me why you did it.”

Barry finally lifted his head. He looked at Thomas and for the first time, he saw none of the man’s usual hardness. From across the table, Thomas looked at him with an expression of understanding.

Barry breathed a little.

It was the anniversary of his mother’s death. He had gone down to the cemetery to visit her, the same as he had every year. He had brought flowers. He had dressed in her favorite colors. He went down to the grave and he had looked at her name.

Barry stopped playing the memory. He already knew why.

“I couldn’t remember her voice.”

 

“You can save my son.”

Barry could barely hear Thomas. His murmur was all the more weaker against the loud clanging of steel and bursts of gunfire in the background.

Barry leaned in closer, his knees digging into the crumpled debris. Lowered himself to face level with Thomas, whose cowl was broken in half, his left eye swollen and purple, his lip fat, fresh streams of blood caked in his hair and rolling over the outside of his ear.

Barry felt the corner of the letter poke his body, insisting. Barry looked at it. On the envelope, written in fine ink, was the name of Thomas’ son.

Barry looked at it.

_Bruce._

He was starting to remember. Even so, he looked at Thomas. Beaten and bloody. Suit ripped from the center of the bat to his shoulder. Laying against broken concrete in the middle of battle in a war that was too big for any of them.

“How can I run away from this?” Barry asked.

“The same reason I can leave this world behind. I know a better world... will replace it.” His breaths were heavy, his broken body expanding with air with each word. “But… I am sorry…”

Barry reached for the letter.

“Blue.”

“What?”

“My favorite colors.”

The hand stopped.

“You can bury me in bluebells and forget-me-nots.” The letter was pushed into Barry’s hand. “You can take that with you.”

 

Barry stood at the doorway of his childhood home. The memories of the place mixed together. He could recall playing in the backyard with his dad. He could recall the caution tape and blinking lights. And there were other things—things that almost seemed false, like him, as a teenager, walking back from school.

But it wasn’t false, in a way. It was real. Like all of the time he had spent there.

He stood in the doorway, Thomas’ letter in his pocket, and stared at the empty road.

Nora’s hand touched his shoulder. Barry felt afraid to look back, knowing almost too well how weak his resolve really was.

“It’s alright, Barry,” she assured him for what felt like the hundredth time. “I love you. You know that. You’ll always know that.”

Nora wrapped her arms around him. Barry looked down at the folded hands around his middle. He took them, holding them for a moment.

“I never gave up on you,” Barry said. It was the words he always wanted to tell her. After Dad died. After he hung up the case. After he married Iris. After he started visiting her only on the anniversaries of her death. “Never.”

“You’ll be alright, Barry,” he heard her speak. And that was that.

Barry could admit that it was a better goodbye than the last.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> If anyone is wondering what happens to Thomas and Barry after the story, it's meant to be a little open. I originally wrote an epilogue but then decided to scrap it.
> 
> A reminder that after "Flashpoint", the DC Universe reset itself. Barry is no longer married to Iris. Wally West disappeared (until Rebirth).
> 
> But as of "The Button", Thomas' timeline still exists, and Barry still recalls his memories of Thomas.
> 
> So it's up to you to decide if Barry's ending is a happy one or not...
> 
> Also, side note, sorry if the porn felt out of place/not in the same tone as the rest of the fic. As I mentioned in the beginning, I started to write this as porn first, and plot second. :'D Hopefully you all enjoyed it anyways. Thank you for reading.
> 
>  
> 
> [My Tumblr](https://lacemonsterbats.tumblr.com/)
> 
>  
> 
> [My Twitter](https://twitter.com/lacemonsterbats)


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